Monday, August 24, 2015

The narrative among those in the majority population is that they are angry. So when they try to get their wine on and bond a little bit among each other, said folks from the majority population get their hate on.

Anyway, here is a sad story from wine country:

"What started as a joyous ride through wine county Saturday afternoon turned into a “humiliating” experience for 11 African American women, who said they were booted off the Napa Valley WineTrain for laughing and talking too loud.

Accounts and pictures of the episode have been spreading across social media, spawning the hashtag #LaughingWhileBlack while the women involved have questioned whether they would have been treated differently if they were not African American.

“It was humiliating. I’m really offended to be quite honest,” said 47-year-old Lisa Johnson, who was among Saturday’s group. “I felt like it was a racist attack on us. I feel like we were being singled out.”

The women have since been given a full refund by the train company, but continue to seek a public apology.

In a statement Sunday, Napa Valley Wine Train spokeswoman Kira Devitt said the company “received complaints from several parties in the same car and after three attempts from staff, requesting that the group keep the noise to an acceptable level, they were removed from the train and offered transportation back to the station in Napa.”

The incident began when Johnson and her book club, the Sisters on the Reading Edge, embarked around 11 a.m. for their annual trip through wine country — an adventure they had been planning since November.

The women — all wearing matching T-shirts — were all seated in the same car in adjacent tables and seats, laughing and having a good time. They and the other passengers on the sold-out train were ordering tastings and glasses of wine as they rode the 18-mile stretch from Napa to St. Helena through California’s most famous and picturesque vineyards and wineries.

And while the group — which included an 83-year-old grandmother — may at times have been “rambunctious,” they were not “obnoxious or intoxicated,” Johnson said.

Several passengers, she said, even came up to them to take pictures, and asked about the romance novel they were reading for their club.

But a short while into their trip, Johnson said a manager on the train asked them to pipe it down.
“The train is set up to be with your friends, to drink wine and have a good time,” Johnson said. “We were thinking, ‘Who are we offending?’”

Later on, Johnson said the manager told them that “this isn’t going to work,” and that if they didn’t “tone it down,” they were going to be asked to get off the train.

“It was a bizarre thing for all of us,” she said, adding that many in the group quieted down and wondered what had happened.

According to Johnson, one of the women in the same car told the group “this isn’t a bar.”
“And we though, um, yes it is,” Johnson said.

What came next, she said, was the worst part of the afternoon. When the train pulled into the St. Helena station, the group had to do the “walk of shame” as they were escorted past passengers on the six other cars, Johnson said. At the station, the group was met by officers from the Napa Valley Railroad and St. Helena police departments.

“People were looking at us,” Johnson said. “To get escorted into the hands of waiting police officers. That’s the humiliating part.”

But Chief Jeff Hullquist of the Napa Valley Railroad Police Department said there “was no police action taken” at the station.

“When someone is removed from a train, they have to be dropped off at a station, and our policy is if someone is let off the train we’ll stand by,” he said. “We keep them safe until someone can get them.”

“The Napa Valley Wine Train does not enjoy removing guests from our trains, but takes these things very seriously in order to ensure the enjoyment and safety of all of our guests,” Devitt said, adding that about once a month guests need to be removed from the train.

Johnson said despite their treatment on the ride, the company has worked with them. They were given a refund, provided with free pictures, and a van was sent to pick them up.

“The people in the station were absolutely wonderful,” she said, ready to let the incident go.

But that’s when someone from the company posted an account of the incident on Facebook. Johnson was miffed.

“Following verbal and physical abuse toward other guests and staff, it was necessary to get our police involved,” the since-deleted post reads in part, which Johnson captured in a screen grab and re-posted to Facebook.“Many groups come on board and celebrate. When those celebrations impact our other guests, we do intervene.”

The post was quickly taken down and the company reached out to the women to make amends, she said." [Source]

"Our police".

Anyway, I love how Jeff Hullquist says that they were just protecting grown women and keeping them "safe". What was going to happen? Were they going to get attacked by a mob of wine tasters?

Give me a break!

Accused of "verbal and physical abuse" simply for laughing together and having a good time.
Unbelievable.

62 comments:

I met some folks who worked for the wine train back in the '90s when I did deliveries out of the duty-free zone on Pier 19 in SF. I remember thinking that they seemed like stuck up pricks who thought really highly of themselves. Maybe I was right?

As I was reading and got to the part of the police waiting for them! I got chills! Because what would have happened if they had actually been arrested and put in cells??? O,O You know what that means! You know the MO with that!!! OMG!

They escaped with their lives narrowly!!!

I'm telling you and them, stay away from the white, blue eyed ones...they no good!

I won't go, nope nuh uh, the h*** with that winey train ride! That's the train ride for browns and blacks to the Gestapo and gas chambers (euphimistically aka 'jail cells').

The only reason they didn't get put in the death cells is the social media thing. OMG!

When you go to the link Field gives, you go to on one of their Facebook pages. And they were so happy to be going on that tour! They had made a little video as they were boarding, (if you to the FB go you can see it) and these are all professional women, an author, you can see they are great people out to have a little fun on that wine tour!

Not really sure what to make of this. I wasn't there, so it's hard to know whose story to believe.

Maybe these women's fellow passengers were intolerant and/or bigoted, and the train's staff overreacted to complaints.

On the other hand, maybe these women really were drunker, and therefore ruder, than they realized and actually deserved to be chucked off the train. The women in the picture look nice enough, but ... let's be real, sometimes people do act obnoxiously. "People" does include black women.

Really? The cops were going to kill them, over allegedly acting disorderly on the wine train?! Kinda doubt it. The police were only called in case they refused to leave the train when asked. No one had actually accused these women of committing any crime.

It's one thing if you think this was inappropriate for the train crew to do this, but let's not get carried away here.

@Yisheng

You're going to boycott wine from an entire wine-growing region because of the behavior of the actions of this one train operator? If that's your general approach, you'll very quickly be unable to drink wine from anywhere. I'm sure that somewhere in Italy (and in every wine-growing region or country of the world) at some time, someone has acted like a racist dickhead.

I suspect that they were loud and the people who complained about it were racists. The winery might call security, that they refer to as their police, to stop people from driving drunk and to break up fights. It could be a procedure that they follow every time someone is asked to leave, whether it is needed or not. The saddest thing to me is that the outing that the ladies do ever year, and look forward to, was permanently ruined.

As a bm let me say the truth: Negroes are just too damn loud, esp the sisters. This is ridiculous. Blacks can't even go on a lovely train ride through Napa Valley without fucking up everything. No wonder nobody wants to be around us.

What the hell is wrong with you ignorant unsophisticated Lilac-Yisheng-like sisters?

"Dear Brother Field, please post about these unruly out of control sick-ass sisters. I could see where one or two sisters would be loud, but ALL ELEVEN?

These women were so loud they had the police waiting on their stupid asses at the next stop. This is sooooo embarrassing for bw. As a bm this shit would have never happened.

And before Lilac or Yisheng say anything, let me say to them to just STFU."

I just wanted to put this 'out there' because you know, Negroes on FN tend to side with loudmouths. As a bm, I KNOW those women were loud. Negroes are always a bunch of loud-mouths. I can't even enjoy a movie without screaming loud talking bw talking through the entire damn movie. Field, you know what I am talking about because you have posted about this shit several times.

Now, they asked the sisters several times to please tone it down. Did they? NO they did not. I swear. Negroes just don't know how to act. And then they have the nerve to feel humiliated when they throw their black asses off the train.

I am very surprised at Lilac and Yisheng for acting like those 11 sisters were innocent. They were not and you two need own up to the truth.

Lilac, I know you know better. Yisheng is more ignorant and less sophisticated than those country sisters.

I also thought the fact the women all appeared to be dark brown skinned played a role in how they were treated.Throw in an Afro or two and the wimps on the train were probably scared to death before they even art their lips to sip their wine.

Why on earth do you want to share a wine train with people who practice and expect restrained emotions, subdued voices, and watching the landscape go by while sipping various varietals? If that's so boring, why don't you create a Sistahs Sauvignon, Shiraz and Syrah Sojourn? It can be all Black and you can be as loud as you want. If you don't like White society, do it your way!

I'm sure you'll have to pay a premum for damages and to have ambulances standing by at stations for the losers of the inevitable fights, but you will be free to be just as Black as you want on the SSSSS!

"Really? The cops were going to kill them, over allegedly acting disorderly on the wine train?! Kinda doubt it. The police were only called in case they refused to leave the train when asked. No one had actually accused these women of committing any crime.

It's one thing if you think this was inappropriate for the train crew to do this, but let's not get carried away here."---------------

Blacks get killed over a traffic ticket. They go to jail for getting a traffic ticket.

They get hung while in jail.

They get shot in the back by cops.

Many things strangely happen to Blacks.

So yes, "really". Evil things happen to innocent Blacks by Whites. That is no secret. It's been happening for centuries. Where the hell have you been?

You are definitely a White person in denial and furthermore, don't care whether a black person gets justice or dies.

At 80+ I am sick and tired of this racist crap. However, CA is a racist state. I don't think social media makes a difference in attitudes of racists at all.

The train company needs to fess up who was complaining. If those people can get people kicked off the train, then they should, in all fairness, have a right to face their accusers. But this is America, what's more, it's Napa Valley.

I once got sentenced to 6 mos. for "verbal assault" , and oddly enough the complainant (s) were white. FYI this was in the south. These devils are as evil as they come, and will stick with each other to the death, no matter how depraved. That was just one incident among many living while Black in amerikkka. I got accosted and almost kidnapped once while walking while Black, and the kicker was this was outside of my job, also in the south! Needless to say, that was a fun-filled work experience! Thanks Pigs! I got stories like this for days, watch some crackkker on here accuse me of playing the "race card".

People (real people, that is, not primitive hominids) are scared of blacks because they are so unpredictable. You say the wrong thing, even politely, and you're liable to get stabbed or slashed or worse. Blacks don't think about the consequences of their actions - they only know that someone is "disrespecting" them, and they ATTACK.

Plus blacks are just plain unpleasant to be around. The noise, the smell, etc.

This is interesting. I don't know if this is "racism" or if it is a clash of cultures. Or maybe classes. Would they have thrown out a group of loud White women with strong regional accents? Maybe. Probably happens all the time but of course it doesn't get any press. What would those women say on Facebook? The have no slogan to spout ... they could call the wine train "snobs" but there wouldn't be anything juicy in that. Racism is so much juicier and self-righteous.

Some Asians think Whites are loud and aggressive and rude, some Whites think the same of Blacks. One person's rights end where the other person's begin. It might have been a clash of culture; it might have been stereotyping "oh oh, I know what happens when blacks start getting loud ... it gets ugly, I have seen it ... I better report this ..."

There's a lot of misunderstanding over stupid shit in this country, people not being able to really read a person. Thinking someone's a snob when they're really not, thinking someone's a hood when they're really not. I don't know what to think of this incident except that 2 types of people had 2 different expectations of what kind of time they were going to have aboard this train ... one sipping wine, mellowing out and the other having a good laugh with a bunch of friends and family. They need to have a quiet car like they do on the commuter trains ... no cellphone, etc etc ... no loud talking, sip your wine and pass out. Then they need another car where you can let loose. I don't know. If this had been all White people, it wouldn't be an issue, they would have kicked them off the train and that would have been that. Race makes all the difference I guess.

It was one middle aged white woman, (very bitter looking at that)who complained, there is a pic of her on the Facebook page.

But if she thinks her bitterness can be helped, soothed,or diminished by doing that, she has a lot of complaining to do my friend!

I feel sorry for that white woman, she's perennially sad and bitter! The sisters on the other hand are accomplished, auto-realized professionals with full and happy lives ahead of them! If they stay away from we all know who that is!

No, because with the White women it would be framed as a bad behavior issue so no one would care. Newspapers wouldn't pick up the story. It wouldn't be on Facebook. With the Black women it is a "racism" issue. Even if they were totally obnoxious it would always be a "racism" issue. Unless of course it was other Blacks that were complaining about them. Something like Blacks shooting Blacks doesn't make it with the media, its not a story people want to hear.

"Can't even have wine and laugh in America if you're brown and black!"

Wine is a White invention. Black people drinking wine is cultural appropriation (as is using a computer, driving an automobile, using running water, or living in a building made of steel, baked bricks or sawed lumber). Those women from Oakland are Aunt Thomasinas!

I'd be nervous if I was on a train with 11 drunk negros too. Throw in the fact that almost ALL interracial violence is black on white, I figure they had good reason to be nervous.

I bet $1000 that every white voter on that train is a registered Democrat and voted for Obama. They like blacks (usually) because they have never had the extreme displeasure of living around large numbers of black people.

They get to see first hand what it's like dealing with the mudmonsters first hand. Let them get a taste of what they stick upfor on a daily basis, while living far, far away from the cancerouselement of the mud monsters !!

dem dang mud monsters are actin a fool again ya'll.

And as we all know it's not limited to just one area.

Errywhere da negro goes, society as we know it goes down with them.

Indisputable facts! Facts that the under-man can't handle,which in turn, turns to racismmmmmmmmmmm, whatever that is.

Oh, we know what that is. It's like dealing with a 5 year oldchild that doesn't understand the meaning of the word "no" !!!

This is the reason why sites like sbpdl.com exists !!!

Somebody explain to me, why does assimilation have to be forcedupon us, I mean if we really desired to be around the negrowouldn't it just happen naturally ? Of course it wouldn't !!Who really wants to be around the negro, ever ? NOBODY intheir sane mind, that's who. Yeah, yeah, take your racismand shove it where the sun don't shine. It's called racialdifferences. Just like males and females are different, soare whites and blacks. Nobody had to teach me that, I foundout very much so for myself. It's called intelligence, get some !!!

They get to see first hand what it's like dealing with the mudmonsters first hand. Let them get a taste of what they stick upfor on a daily basis, while living far, far away from the cancerouselement of the mud monsters !!

dem dang mud monsters are actin a fool again ya'll.

And as we all know it's not limited to just one area.

Errywhere da negro goes, society as we know it goes down with them.

Indisputable facts! Facts that the under-man can't handle,which in turn, turns to racismmmmmmmmmmm, whatever that is.

Oh, we know what that is. It's like dealing with a 5 year oldchild that doesn't understand the meaning of the word "no" !!!

This is the reason why sites like sbpdl.com exists !!!

Somebody explain to me, why does assimilation have to be forcedupon us, I mean if we really desired to be around the negrowouldn't it just happen naturally ? Of course it wouldn't !!Who really wants to be around the negro, ever ? NOBODY intheir sane mind, that's who. Yeah, yeah, take your racismand shove it where the sun don't shine. It's called racialdifferences. Just like males and females are different, soare whites and blacks. Nobody had to teach me that, I foundout very much so for myself. It's called intelligence, get some !!!

It was never created by your folks anyways, so whydo you feel that you should have the right to enjoysomething you cannot invent or produce.

Ahhh, there is a flip side to EVERYTHING !!!

It's as clear as black and white.

Do you honestly think that this business wouldn't surviveif it wasn't for blacks enjoying some wine on a train ride ?

That's the part that's unbelievable to me !!!!!!!!!!!!

How about you black folks go and open up your own train ride,then you and yours can drink and party your way right back tothat primitive mentality you negroes resort to so well.

Speaking of primitive. I look back 10 years ago at hurricanekah-treeee-nah and think about what happened at the superdome.A murder, a rape, committed by none other than the black plagueitself. YT was out helping fellow people and the black folkswere just sitting there, unable to help themselves and waitingfor someone else to help them instead. This is what negroes do.

A majority of them didn't help nobody else out, but themselvesby the way of looting. Whenever you leave the negro left to it'sown device, it automatically resorts to it's primitive mind statethat it seems it can never escape. LOL at the thought of YT keepingya'll down. Just another case of putting the blame on others.It's easier to do. That word "accountability" must be too longof a word, a YT made word, that's obviously racist, especiallywhen you try to hold the negro accountable to 1st world civilizationstandards. You simply can't! They're not 1st world civilizationtype folks. Why we're eating steak, they're still eating bush meat!

I swear if ya'll had brains you'd be even worse thanwhat you folks already are. Sweet Jeebus! Anytime yougive them the opportunity to resort back to their normaldevice, they resort back to being in the jungle, as ifthey ever left it.

Once again, you can take em out the jungle but you can'ttake the jungle out of them. They're hardwired. It can'tbe adjusted! When will humans understand this indisputablefact ?

Blacks, as well as all minorities are just naturally loud. I try not to ride public transportation, but in the rare case when I am forced to, all I hear are loud ghetto blacks who won't shut up, Asians speaking in their annoying ching chong languages, and probably illegal Latinos blabbering in Spanish. Learn how to behave correctly on the bus, losers.

I know this is a long post, but please at least scroll down to the last paragraph where I ask everyone an honest question. I'll say up front that I'm white and I am trying to understand the level of outrage toward the company over this. I'm commenting on your blog b/c, while I find your view extreme, I think you're intelligent and thoughtful and that we want the same thing: peace. Please read this carefully (everyone) and really try to explain it to me (people with more than insults to give). White people need to understand, and the African-American community needs the white community to understand; nothing will get better if there is confusion and we're left guessing what the other side is thinking and feeling.

It was undoubtedly a humiliating experience for those women, and I wasn't there (and neither were any of you) to judge for myself how loud they really were. From the company's point of view, they had complaints from other passengers. No doubt that most if not all of the passengers who complained were white. Maybe their complaints were racist and they would not have complained if the group had been white; I can't deny that b/c I can't read their minds. So yes, the complaints could have had racist motivation...or not. The fact is, many talk about how uptight wine country tourists can be, but BEING UPTIGHT IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING RACIST. If you spend any time with those types of people (uptight white folks), you'll soon see that noise is one of the main things they're uptight about, regardless of race. I'm not saying they aren't racists in their hearts, but as someone immersed in the white world I believe any really loud group would've received complaints and have been kicked off for not lowering their voices.

So back to the company. They got several complaints from other people in the same train car. What should they have done? They could have moved the group to another train car (which would have been called racist, I'm sure) or moved the people who complained to another car if they had room elsewhere (although I bet those customers would loudly resent having to move when it was others who were being disruptive). The point is, some African-American cultures (and many other cultures, including white cultures) are louder/more boisterous than majority white culture. I agree that this train is a bar, but every bar comes with its own culture based on who runs it and who goes there, and there are different expectations. Not all places where people drink allow people to be loud, even if they are otherwise not harming anyone. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the women were repeatedly warned that they had to keep it down. They chose to believe they were being singled out and defy the warnings. So then the employees followed through on their warnings. Granted, it seems extreme that they called the police, and I'd want to know exactly what they meant in their statement that the women were verbally and physically abusive (just b/c they didn't do what they were told?). But making them get off the train? What else could they have done??

MY MAIN QUESTION: Do private places have the right to enforce certain rules of behavior (for example, kicking someone out of a bar if they are falling-down drunk or denying someone access to a restaurant b/c it is a dressy place and the person showed up in jeans)? Or do we have to tolerate anything short of illegal activity and not be able to expect certain standards (for example, quiet at a yoga studio or silence during a movie)?

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